


Nor Yet Canst Thou Kill Me

by flashforeward



Category: X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: Fix-It, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-10
Updated: 2016-05-10
Packaged: 2018-06-07 15:18:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 450
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6810760
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flashforeward/pseuds/flashforeward
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dying hurts. Death is worse. Coming back to life is worst.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Nor Yet Canst Thou Kill Me

**Author's Note:**

> Title from John Donne's poem "Death Be Not Proud".
> 
> (Moving yet another fic over from LJ bcuz I'm thinking about Darwin's illogical demise today)

Dying hurts.

It should, really.

He feels it - the energy - welling inside him. He fights, adapts, feels himself changing, trying to stay ahead even as it overwhelms him. He feels the heat, feels his skin cracking, and as he reaches out to Alex - a farewell he should not have to make - he feels himself crumble.

The pain is worse than any he has felt before.

Yes, dying hurts.

-

Being dead is worse.

It isn't so much painful as frustrating. He is there and no one knows. He can feel every bit of himself - even the parts blowing in the wind - and he keeps forgetting he's in pieces and trying to move. He's one hundred percent sure he must be dead, but this is nothing like he imagined death would be.

There are no bright lights, no other side. There is only his consciousness stuck in his shattered body.

For awhile, he's convinced this must be hell.

-

Coming back to life is worst.

It is both painful and frustrating because he has to bring every scattered piece of himself back together again - any missing piece could be something vital and he would not know until it was too late. So he slowly and carefully pulls himself together until he is whole.

He is naked and cold and alone, but he is whole and he knows where to go.

The upside of his not-death was he could hear. He knows where to find his friends.

-

He relishes the looks of surprise when he reaches the mansion - only Xavier looks unfazed. He suffers through a meeting with the professor before he can escape the mansion and the thousand questions to find the one person he has not yet seen: Havok.

Alex.

Alex has been avoiding him, so Armando has to hunt him down.

"You didn't kill me," he says when he finds his friend - sitting alone at the edge of the grounds, hidden in the shadow of a tree.

Alex won't look at him. "I saw you die," he says.

"I adapted."

Alex looks around. His eyes are red from tears and his voice cracks as he chokes out, "You were in pieces!"

"I adapted. Like I always do."

He sits down next to Alex, who stares at him a moment longer, then lays his head on Armando's shoulder. "I missed you," he whispers.

"I missed me, too," Armando replies, and he cherishes the laugh that slips from Alex's lips.

And as they sit beneath that tree watching the sun set, Armando lets himself smile for the first time since he became whole again.

Because he is home. Because he belongs. Because he is alive.

But most of all because he never died.


End file.
